By Arthur Levine. Last week the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education released model state legislation to create teaching fellowships for high school seniors willing to teach in high-need schools. Their approach includes a four-year college scholarship, accompanied by professional development, in exchange for a commitment to teach in a high-need school for four years. It is an excellent idea — and it could go farther still. Read more...
16 février 2014
We Need Ed Schools
Let’s Scramble, Not Flip, the Classroom
By Pamela E. Barnett. The “flipped classroom” is the idea of the moment, advocated by everyone from Bill Gates to Eric Mazur, the pioneering science educator. This educational innovation is exciting and promising – but I’d argue for a slight revision to the discourse to make sure we don’t replace one rigid format with another. My suggestion: let’s scramble, not flip, the classroom. Read more...
Health Care Home Stretch
By Allie Grasgreen. Young Invincibles, the political advocacy group that has been helping students and other people under 35 enroll in health care programs under the Affordable Care Act before the March 31 deadline, has more than 100 events planned around the country Saturday as part of National Youth Enrollment Day. The events are, in part, an effort to make up some of the ground that was lost due to debilitating malfunctions on the federal enrollment website, HealthCare.gov. Read more...
Swift Changes to Aid Sites
By Michael Stratford. Dozens of colleges and universities have changed the wording of their financial aid web pages since a Democratic Congressman last week accused more than 100 institutions of misleading students about the requirements for obtaining federal grants and loans. Read more...
Moodle for the Masses
By Carl Straumsheim. Moodle edges out competitors such as Blackboard among smaller colleges, a new analysis of the learning management systems shows, lending some evidence to the anecdotal popularity of open-source solutions among those institutions. The analysis, published by the former Blackboard engineer George Kroner on his Edutechnica blog, shows familiar players such as Blackboard, Desire2Learn and Instructure are major forces in the market among institutions with 1,000 to 2,000 full-time students. Read more...
GAO Urges Debit Card Changes
By Michael Stratford. The U.S. Government Accountability Office on Thursday urged federal policy makers to tighten the regulations on campus debit cards and require disclosure of the agreements colleges have with the companies that offer such products. The recommendations, which were part of a 15-month Congressional study of campus debit cards, were released less than a week before the Education Department is set to begin negotiations over its regulations that govern the cards. Read more...
Going All In on Proficiencies
By Paul Fain. The University of Maine at Presque Isle is moving beyond grades by basing all of its academic programs on "proficiencies" that students must master to earn a degree. University officials announced the planned move to proficiency-based curriculums on Thursday. While many details have yet to be hashed out, the broad shift by the public institution is sure to raise eyebrows. Read more...
Government grant letter delivers cut to university funding
By . The government has delivered a £125 million cut to higher education funding in today’s grant letter, while criticising vice-chancellors on pay. The letter, sent by David Willetts and Vince Cable to England’s funding council, scraps the dedicated £37 million Access to Learning Fund, which gave discretionary grants to the poorest students. More...
Starting out in a recession 'boosts productivity'
By . Academics who complete their PhDs during a recession are significantly more productive in the long-term than those who do so during a boom, research suggests. Michael Boehm, a researcher at the London School of Economics’ Centre for Economic Performance and Bonn University, looked at data from the top 30 universities in the United States from 1955 to 1994. More...
Home Office suspends English language tests
By . The Home Office has suspended an organisation’s English language tests for immigration purposes after cheating was allegedly uncovered on some exams.
Theresa May, the home secretary, told the education sector to “put its own house in order” following revelations about the immigration scam. The BBC’s Panorama programme found that students were able to get others to take the English Testing Service (ETS) exams for them in order to get round English language requirements for student visas. It found that an undercover reporter was able to pay £500 to an immigration consultancy for a “guaranteed pass” on the English tests. More...
